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Article

John A. Emerson, Jane Bellingham and David Hiley

In

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Article

Geoffrey Chew

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Published in print:

20 January 2001

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2001

In ancient Roman comedies, the sung lyric sections as opposed to the diverbi or sections containing spoken dialogue; and, in a narrower sense, the sections sung by soloists (rather than the chorus) with instrumental accompaniment. In the latter sense the cantica were analogous to monody in Greek drama. In the comedies of Plautus, the ...

John A. Emerson, Jane Bellingham and David Hiley

In

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Article

Kenneth Levy

In

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Article

Geoffrey Chew and Thomas J. Mathiesen

Publication History:

Published in print:

20 January 2001

Published online:

2001

Funeral song in ancient Rome in praise of a dead person, analogous to the Greek
Thrēnos
(threnody). It was generally sung by praeficae (professional female mourners) or by female relatives of the dead person, to the accompaniment of one or more tibiae, or to the lyra; the tuba and cornu were also used for funeral music, often as purely instrumental music. The ...

Article

Thomas J. Mathiesen

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Published in print:

20 January 2001

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2001

One of the genres of ancient Greek music. Descriptions of specific nomoi in Greek literary sources suggest a complex style that came to be associated with virtuoso performers. Proclus's Useful Knowledge associates the term with one of his many epithets for
Apollo, Nomimos, and provides a brief history of the genre: Chrysothemis the Cretan, wearing a splendid robe and playing the kithara in imitation of Apollo, was the first to sing a solo ...

Article

Thomas J. Mathiesen

Publication History:

Published in print:

20 January 2001

Published online:

2001

Ancient Greek choral hymn addressed to Apollo, Artemis, Zeus, Dionysus, Asclepius or Hygieia. Proclus's Useful Knowledge defines it as a species of song specifically assigned to be sung to Apollo and Artemis for the cessation of plagues and maladies but later written for all the gods. The term is also applied to military hymns; hymns composed in honour of an important event, such as the ratification of a treaty; and, later, hymns addressed to prominent persons. In the ...

Article

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Published in print:

20 January 2001

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2001

The official monophonic unison chant (originally unaccompanied) of the Christian liturgies. The term, though general, is used to refer particularly to the chant repertories with Latin texts – that is, those of the five major Western Christian liturgies – or in a more restricted sense to the repertory of Franco-Roman chant (...

Article

Richard L. Crocker

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Published in print:

20 January 2001

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2001

A text for a sequence (
see Sequence
). The term was sometimes used loosely in medieval sources to apply to texts of other kinds of chants, for example Kyries, or to text underlay for melismas (a phenomenon better referred to as
Prosula
).

A ...

Article

Paul Frederick Cutter, Brad Maiani, Davitt Moroney and John Caldwell

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20 January 2001

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2001

A category of Western chant serving at Matins and monastic Vespers as musical postludes to the reading of lessons, as the gradual and alleluia do at the Mass. Indeed, responsories make up the greater part of Matins, and in the total repertory of Roman chant are surpassed in quantity only by Office antiphons. From about 600 in their earliest musical source, the Hartker manuscript dating from about 1000 (PalMus, 2nd ser., i, ...

John A. Emerson, Jane Bellingham and David Hiley

In

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Article

John A. Emerson, Jane Bellingham and David Hiley

In

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Article

Ruth Steiner, Keith Falconer and John Caldwell

Publication History:

Published in print:

20 January 2001

Published online:

2001

A chant in praise of God sung at the end of Matins on Sundays and feast days, either after the last responsory (the medieval practice) or in its stead (the modern one). It has also been used as a processional chant, the conclusion for a liturgical drama, a song of thanksgiving on an occasion such as the consecration of a bishop, and a hymn of victory on the battlefield. During the Middle Ages it was widely believed that St Ambrose and St Augustine composed the ...